The Mystery of Prayer
The Rev. Canon William A. Kolb

Gospel: John 15:1-8

Names are part of us, might even say that they are sacred. God's chosen people, the first people God ever related to, were not even allowed to say or spell God's Name. They knew God as Yahweh, but when they wrote God's name they would write YHWH, an abbreviation, and they would never say the name. We know that some peoples won't allow their pictures to be taken, because they feel that a piece of their spirit will be stolen in the process. Well, God would not allow His face to be seen, NOR would God allow His name to be said.

Names are so important. When you have a person's name you have a piece of them, in a sense. Our names are part of our identity. A name is not just a name....

Take Jesus' name. In Philippians we read that "at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth --- the name above all names."

Now we don't really mean that everyone should bow at the NAME of Jesus but at what the name represents--all that the name represents. We do not bow when we hear the name "Jesus" if we know it refers to an ordinary mortal living here and now. So what we are bowing for, what we are worshipping is the essence of Jesus, the history of Jesus, the Lordship of Jesus.

Now you might very well wonder, why I am going on and on about names? What's that got to do with anything?

Well, it's got to do with this problem that I have. There are some writings in scripture that I either find hard to understand or hard to believe. Some of these passages, I know, were written by the early Church to justify and further some of its agenda; some appear in only one Gospel and are thus subject to some scrutiny.

But the one I would like to look at this morning appears in various wording in the Gospels at least four times. It is familiar. It is hard to ignore. And yet a lot of us have trouble with it.

It is in our morning reading from John's Gospel, it says, "…if you abide in me and my words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish and it will be done for you." When I read this selection and studied others that are closely related to it, I immediately was drawn to the concept that if we ask God for something in the name of Jesus Christ, we shall have our prayer granted.

My problem with that of course, is that many have prayed in Jesus' name for the safety or healing of a loved one, for example, and they have nevertheless lost that person. How can we understand this saying in scripture, attributed to Jesus: "Whatever you ask in My name, that will I do, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son."? It seems to me on the surface at least, to be at best inaccurate and at worst a provocation to anger for those who have suffered deeply when their prayers were not granted.

And the reason that I went on and on about the power and purpose and mysterious depth of a name, is because when we pray in the name of Jesus, we are doing a whole lot more than just saying, "We pray this through Jesus Christ our Lord."

It is not just saying, we pray this in the name of Christ. It is saying that in accord with everything that Christ was, we pray. We are not just saying words or even just naming a name. We are praying through and in accord with Jesus' birth at Bethlehem, the miracle of the ages. We are praying through Jesus' ministry among so many, and through all of his teachings; we are praying through his faith and his courage, through his death and through his resurrection. And don't forget, that when we say through Jesus Christ our Lord,we are saying He is Lord, that is, He is the boss, and we are acknowledging that we pray with the knowledge that he prayed, desperately almost, to be spared from the suffering of the cross but then said, "…not my will but thine be done."

So there is this innocent little phrase, "whatever you ask in my Name I will do…" and we may take it as comfort, then when what we asked does not happen we wonder if it is accurate or if there is something about it we just don't understand. But in fact what it means is that we pray, yes, but we are told to pray with absolute trust in God's response, whatever it is.

It may not be what we want. It may, however, be what we need. Or perhaps not. Whatever it is, God knows how disappointed we might be. If in God's infinite wisdom things are going to stay disappointing, God also promises to be there with us. To comfort and strengthen us and perhaps to show us, over time, the why of God's wisdom when it comes to what we want and pray for.

Now that we have that somewhat sorted out at least for the moment, what do we have? Are we saying that our prayers will consistently be granted if we "abide in Christ and he in us?" Are we saying that if I have cancer and ask that it be cured, it will be cured if I pray in the spirit of all that Jesus is and was and if I have lived a life that reflects his life?

Well, no we are not saying that. We are left with that of which faith has an bundance: mystery. Listen to this letter to the editor of the "Faith and Values" section of the Memphis Commercial Appeal, which I think is relevant to our exploration of prayer this morning:

Every time someone is on the TV news or in the newspaper after they have survived a tragedy and says that God must have saved them for a reason, I just want to scream. If that is true, then why wasn't my 17-year-old daughter saved from a tragic one-car accident in which the driver, who was driving recklessly and was totally at fault, walked away with no injuries while my daughter was killed? I certainly can't blame God for that or think that the driver must have been saved by God for some higher purpose. I also can't think that my daughter or I were being punished by God. (Copyright 2003 Commercial Appeal, May 17, 2003, Memphis, TN, published by E.W. Scripps Company.)

With that, we end where we started: with questions, with the knowledge that pain and tragedy are part of life, and that prayer is a total mystery. As we ponder these thoughts, we might want to consider the conclusion reached about prayer in the nineteenth century by Danish existential theologian Soren Kierkegaard: "Prayer does not change what God is going to do; prayer changes the pray-er." Food for thought, and perhaps for prayer.

Amen.

Copyright 2003 Calvary Episcopal Church

Excerpted from a sermon preached at Calvary Episcopal Church, Memphis, Tennessee, May 18, 2003.

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